Category: Art Journey

As long as I can remember, I’ve gotten choked up talking about things which matter deeply to me.

Eventually, I guess I got used to it, even while realizing it made others uncomfortable, or judgemental, which made me wish I could quit.

Fast forward to my first year in Seminary. The whole tear thing happened a lot there. So many things mattered deeply! I began to get really concerned when it came time to interview for my summer internship after my first year at CTS. You see, in my very limited practice preaching, I cried.

During my interview with my about-to-be ministry supervisor, I mentioned my concern. Gary, a fairly recent CTS grad himself, gave me this advice:

Be sure to have tissues in your pocket. You wouldn’t want to blow your nose on your sleeve!

We laughed together and I knew I had found my place!

(We’ll ignore for the moment that back in those days of the late 1980’s, women had to pay extra to get a pocket put into a clergy robe! Men, as the theory went, only needed a slit in the side seam of the robe because then they could reach their pants pocket! Anyway…)

The tear phenomenon didn’t stop, though I felt less “bad” about it.

Others, it seemed, did not feel less bad.

The bottom line is this… I cry when things matter.

Yesterday, I found a new way to understand that bit of me.

My discovery came in the midst of some work I’m doing with Dr. Kayleen Asbo. Kayleen is a writer, teacher, musician, artist, historian, and pilgrimage leader whom I first met on my Black Madonna Intentional Creativity® journey, four years ago.

In her Magdalene Emerging reading for Tuesday, I discovered this:

Tears are a royal road. If we want to find our truest path and calling in life, we are to follow our tears!

And in my notes, the ps… And not apologize for them!

I’m in! And now I know why!!!

These days, my tears show up most often when I dream and write and paint about empowering Grandmothers to survive and thrive in this world so they can empower their littles – the ones they love the most – to do the same.

And all this tear-knowing made me wonder…

Where are your tears calling you to follow?

I really hope you’ll share! Leave a comment here, or email me. suesvoice@gmail.com

In this moment, I’m off to work some more on my Intentional Grandmothers Archetype project. It’s closer and closer to ready!!!

I’ll leave you, though, with a bit of Kayleen’s prayer:

May I pay fierce attention to where I am called by love’s deepest longings.

May it be so for you, whatever your tradition. May it be so for all of us.

ps… That’s a glimpse of my Bella Mama in the photo.

When I was about 3 1/2 years old, my Dad got a new job which meant a move from Cleveland to Pittsburg. As the oral tradition tells it, I had two questions before I “agreed” to the move.

Did Pittsburg have corn on the cob? And, did they have Romper Room?

It might have been a sign. I’ve spent a whole lot of my time since then learning.

After Pittsburg came St. Louis, where there was no public kindergarten. There was a ballet teacher but she was scary and I didn’t want to pretend to be a helicopter!

I started first grade able to count to 10 and write my name, which, in this time would be considered woefully behind the curve.

Had I known about Heaven, I would have thought it was first grade and assumed that Mrs. McKnight was God. I’ve pretty much been at it ever since.

It feels like the pace is picking up a bit in these days and, somewhere in my consciousness, the voices have awakened again.

The Muse is delighted.

The Critic, not so much.

We’ll let the Critic go first as she is decidedly the loudest.

No! Run! Very Scary! People like us don’t think things like this! What will other people think?

Perhaps you’ve met.

The Muse, on the other hand, has taken to quoting my friend Sam Bennett.

Oh!

To get the full effect, tip your head slightly to one side and, with rounded lips and a little lift to your voice…

Oh! (Like curious surprise…)

They’re keeping me up, nights, those two, which is no particular surprise. You see, they’re both trying to help.

The Critic believes that we know what’s safe by the fact that it’s familiar. That we’ve lived through it before. Preferably many, many generations of before. (But, sometimes, those things didn’t really work very well at all… they were only familiar.)

The Muse, on the other hand, likes possibilities. She’s a What if? kind of girl.

Here’s what kind of got left out on much of my long educational path…

I get to choose!

And here’s the really, really good news…

So do you!

There is a bit of a ya-but to this story, though.

It works better when we choose out of fierce compassion. When we choose out of the most good for the most people. When we choose empowerment rather than domination and subjugation.

So, that’s pretty much my what these days, sprinkled with a fair amount of STARDUST!

There’s more how coming soon.

For now, though… homework! And blessings for your learning.

ps… “ya-but” was one of our son’s favorite phrases when he was about 14 or 15. I think he caught on to the choosing thing early!

pps… the painting is deep underlayers of something which no longer exists in that form. It’s known as, “Oh!”

The one who turned out to be a regular kind of guy with some fancy toys?

Well, at the moment, I feel like his considerably less up to date Grandmother!

It’s like this… I think geographically when it comes to my tech toys.

For example, how do I get the photo from my phone to a Word doc in my laptop so I can print it on the printer that has not yet worked out a relationship with the phone?

Or, how do I get the first half of a WordPress page into an email in Keap and from there to the automation I really, really need but am still just a bit terrified to kill and, thus, need to start over again?

If you’re reading this, there’s a better than even chance that you, too, have versions of this story!

There’s also a good chance that, like me, you have hungry beasties and a Zoom meeting to run and a truckload of emails from people who think that the big thing on their list should be the big thing on your list, too.

And, if we’re being honest, I’ll admit to a bit of temptation when a flash of a memory appeared in my mind. Or heart.

I was at my Minnesota grandparents’ house. Probably about 10 years old. Grampa was at work. Gramma and I were watching soap operas on a black and white TV while she starched and ironed shirts and something with a heavenly aroma roasted in the oven.

Looking back, that day with Gramma seems all safe and familiar and more than a bit Leave it to Beaver.

What I didn’t quite realize in that moment was that Gramma was also an employed woman who cared about lots of big world things like her church and politics. Well, she wasn’t so much employed by that time, but she had been.

She was also the chief financial officer in her family and a long-time guardian for a younger brother with developmental challenges.

And she taught her grandkids math by teaching us to play Cribbage and, later, a game she called Spite and Malice. She even kept our pennies when she won!

All of which made for quite a legacy!

What makes me sad is that I really have no idea how she felt about her life or what dreams she may have had.

I do, vividly, recall her ranting about not seeing the point of the Women’s Movement which I was only beginning to wrap my head around back then.

Here’s what I do know…

She loved me. And, even though she probably couldn’t have imagined my life as it is in this moment, she would have wanted me to be happy and committed to making a difference.

That feels timeless.

For now, back to Quiz emails…

ps… if you would, by any chance, be willing to volunteer to be in the beta test group for the Intentional Grandmothers Archetype Quiz, please email me! suesvoice@gmail.com

pps… early holiday art shoppers welcome! FierceArtWithHeart

For years I’ve loved the stanza of the Lewis Carroll poem that goes like this:

The time has come, the walrus said, to talk of many things: of shoes — and ships — and sealing wax — of cabbages –– and kings — and why the sea is boiling hot — and whether pigs have wings.

I think, when I was a kid, the rhythm of it worked for me. And I really loved the thought of pigs with wings.

It was much later, after we moved to Florida, when I grasped the notion of the oysters a stanza or so farther on, for whom things did not turn out as well as they did for the walrus.

For today, though, it’s the many things in my head — and heart — which no doubt caused these words to start roaming around inside me.

Let’s just say that there are bunches and bunches of thoughts and beliefs and assumptions rattling around within me, becoming somehow new as they encounter each other in my awareness.

Some of those things are words from wise – and open minded! – teachers.

Another is the moon, which is gorgeous tonight.

According to the handy moon gizmo on my phone, this is day 18 of this lunar cycle. Or it was on Saturday night when I pushed buttons to make these words find form.

The 18th lunar day, I read, looks like no other. Nothing happens without a reason in your life today: any event, meeting, or word spoken to you reflects your inner state, beliefs, and intentions like a mirror. Those who are prudent and in harmony with themselves will call this day a blessing. Analyze the developments of the day to facilitate your personal growth.

I will confess to pushing a few more buttons on my phone to check the definition of prudent, which feels somehow cautiously stuffy to me.

Surprise… acting with or showing care and thought for the future.

That, I’ll gladly own!

I do have considerable care and thought for the future. For the world my granddaughters — and all our littles — are going to inherit.

And, if you’ve been reading along for a while, you’re already pretty sure I think we’ve got a whole lot of uphill work to do!

I feel a bit like a crazy quilt. Lots of helter-skelter bits, which somehow manage to become beautiful and keep the ones we love warm.

There’s more work to do on my inner quilt as it becomes visible in the world.

And, frankly, my poor, lonely sewing machine is a whole lot easier to deal with than the auto-email gremlins who live in my laptop.

It’s getting late, though, and, despite my lofty adventures with wonder and newness, there are still dishes to stow in the dishwasher and big dogs who need a stroll around the garden. When Bill gets home, I’d imagine it will be time for our bonding ritual, also known as figuring out what’s for dinner tomorrow.

Which all boils down, perhaps, to the realization that, while pigs with wings are a long shot, people just like us really can make a difference and get dinner on the table. And that does, indeed, feel like a blessing!

I’m in. How about you? What wants doing in your heart?

I’m so hoping you’ll leave a comment or email me! suesvoice@gmail.com

ps… STARDUST is a huge help!

pps… She of the many dots, above, is an early step in the development of my SuperPower SelfPortrait process!

Yep. Kind of strange. And yet, it’s #Work-in-Progress Wednesday and this is where I actually am! I kind of feel like I’m channeling a pop artist named Robert Rauschenberg. Mine, however, are not finished. They are holding their collective breath, waiting to begin.

It used to feel kind of scary, this point in the journey. I mean, what if I messed up?

Now I know more.

Anything can be painted over.

There’s always room for noticing and wondering. And new inspiration.

There’s always a way to be me and be part of a group journey.

The Muse dragged me out of bed at 5:30 this morning, with some help from a cranky neck. She’s thrilled!

The Critic is probably off, carb loading for her part in the drama of not one, but three, paintings about to begin. The part that goes, OMG, what if it doesn’t work? What if nobody likes it? What if nobody UNDERSTANDS it? What if people think you’re strange? Or wrong?

I, too, am rehearsing my lines. From memory. Thanks for your concern. I can tell that you really want to help.

And then, intentional dramatic pause… What I really need is______________________________________.

Please don’t tell anybody, but I learned this particular bit of the script in the first church I served. And life got lots easier to cope with. (At least for me!)

I have a few more tools in my medicine basket, too. One of them came in really handy this morning. You see, the blank canvases aren’t the only things about to change. To be seen.

I feel rather like the famous image of Alice, peering around the curtain, wondering where she has landed!

So, the magic chart. The whole bit with Input and Filters and a Map of Reality. (Just imagine along…)

Rather oddly, I spent a bit more time on the far side this morning, while the big dogs snored in the dark.

The part in the oval shape called Outcome.

Turns out there are, at least figuratively, lots of those little ovals for lots of different issues. Lots of desired outcomes for new plans and projects and strategies.

It’s really exciting! Because there are lots of those things going on in my world.

Which isn’t too different from the way the Big World feels!

The miracle is that, with my magic chart, I’m conscious of the things going on and the ways they relate to really old things and Critic things and fears and a whole lot of other things that hold humans back, but don’t have to.

Feel free to fill in the blanks!

For now, I’m off to have my hair adjusted a bit, having noticed what is working and what hasn’t been, so much, and wondered, a lot, about making it better. I even have pics in my phone!

Isn’t art amazing?

ps… I can tell you, even with all the things in progress, that I do have space for 1 or 2 individual clients… possibly folks who relate to all the circles and projects and strategies…or would like to! suesvoice@gmail.com (We could find time to chat!)